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Comment by nikkwong | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, watching his attitude regarding the entire COVID situation on his recent appearance of the Joe Rogan show really ended the lifelong bout of respect I had for the man. He's paradoxically so brilliant yet so misinformed. His idea that we should all just exit quarantine tomorrow because it's unconstitutional is not only dangerous but also now seems to come from a place of selfishness after this statement. Economists and epidemiologists are in agreement about what the current plan of action should be in the US. Why does he think he knows better?

Not only that, but these types of "normal people vs the evil government" statements only add fuel to the trumpian narrative that corruption and misinformation are everywhere; and all of our institutions are worthless. This is such a consequential position to take and yet he seems to do it without even thinking about the repercussions of his words. Shame on him!

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Different states are in different situations, so opening up his Fremont factory is its own situation. California is already opening up and the state and Fremont has approved Tesla's operation as critical, but Tesla is engaged in an ad hoc struggle with Alameda County.

With Texas reopening the race is on to control the national narrative of COVID. If Texas successfully reopens without being forced to retreat later, it will only strengthen the WH narrative that much of the economic damage has been self-inflicted by blue states, and that further aid would be unfair to red states.

Probably he's just rich enough so that his lived everyday experience suggests that everything is fine. I mean if you had assured access to excellent health care, easy access to testing, a large private garden to spend time outdoors in, and staff who take care of all the chores where normal people might get sick, then there's a good chance you also would feel more relaxed about this pandemic because it's likely to not inconvenience you personally.

Of course, he's still a acting ignorant / stupid, but I'd guess that a certain lack of social skills - empathy in particular - is quite common among startup founders.

I think there's some truth in this, I don't know. We don't see other billionaires being so inappropriately outspoken on these matters. Further, he has a cult-like following that's rare even for billionaires; because of this, the burden should fall on him even further to be more circumspect with his words.

Just think about his public tweet ejaculations which frequently decimate his investor's 401k portfolios. Part of his appeal is how he's so forthcoming about his thoughts; but this is proving to be a double edged sword. As days continue to pass his words feel more and more like an instance of Hanlon's razor, he's not actually trying to project a world view that makes sense; it simply doesn't matter to him. And these externalities which are laying in his wake also don't matter. You will be hard pressed to find a billionaire that's that careless.

its funny that he can "decimate investors 401k" with a "tweet"! i think its part of his sense of humor

> He's paradoxically so brilliant yet so misinformed.

He's not very brilliant though. He may be good at his niche (although I'm not sure what that is judging by the quality of Tesla vehicles), but if you are a subject matter expert in a field that he pretends to know, it becomes very obvious that his knowledge is extremely surface-level and the equivalent of "I read Wikipedia on the plane".

Actually I think his brilliance is in convincing the eager Silicon Valley masses that he's brilliant and that they should invest in his companies - regardless of how poorly they continue to do.

I don't understand your dig on Tesla EVs. Do you not agree they are the best EV on the market? I doubt Elon has had much to do with their quality, he's one person and his companies pull great talent, it's all about his ability to underpay great workers who want to build personal brands around his visionary company missions. I'm not saying he's a great CEO, but he does pull great talent for cheap.

All the bucks stop with him. He's a CEO on the ground floor of a factory, not only overseeing and but also engineering.

Best range? Absolutely. Least likely to try to upsell you to an ICE car? Sure.

Best build quality or after-sales service? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

although I'm not sure what that is judging by the quality of Tesla vehicles

The quality of Tesla's cars are fine, much better than before. Unless what you are talking about is from 3-2 years ago? If so, you're out of date.

Actually I think his brilliance is in convincing the eager Silicon Valley masses that he's brilliant and that they should invest in his companies - regardless of how poorly they continue to do.

Poorly continue to do by what metric? As far as I know as an interested follower, Tesla and SpaceX are doing fine.

Not all epidemologists are in agreement.

Sweden's has basically said the costs of shutting down until a vaccine is found (or until the numbers are low enough you can test-and-track and impose quaruntine or testing on all visitors to the country) are worse than just letting it run its course.

Bare in mind that all government decisions are heavily biased by the optics of that decision, as seen by the average voter when passed through a media filter. If it genuinely cost more QALYs to implement shutdown+exit strategy than just "attempt mitigation with focus on elderly and delay things until you've got enough equipment", it would still be very hard to argue that viewpoint in front of the media.

Arguing "The economy is more important than grandma!" is very difficult, requiring a dive into life expectancy, quality of life metrics, isolation side effects, economic depression side effects, QALYs and what exactly an "economy" even is (and, importantly, what it isn't, like all the non-captured-by-gdp utility gained by just hanging out with friends in the park). Can you imagine a politician trying to argue that grandma is a necessary sacrifice in front of the cameras?

Admittedly, making such an argument isn't impossible: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-8281007/amp/Forme...

Sweden has a rather different welfare system, typical population density, income distribution, typical household demographic, urban planning and culture regarding social interactions, compared to many places that would use it as an example for what to do in this crisis. I think following the available evidence, interpreted by experts is the way to go. Ultimately the argument for Sweden's policy seems to be less based on cost saving than general wellbeing. A good bit of insight here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfN2JWifLCY

Sweden's strategy is also unique in the world and failing badly at protecting some of their most vulnerable citizens. It's also based on unproven ideas, like immunity from Covid19 after you get it once.

If immunity after getting it isn't viable, then surely a vaccine isn't either?

Stamping out COVID19 worldwide simply isn't practical, so isn't the omly option to just live with it? We manage to live with far worse things, like ageing.

Aging is not killing hundreds of people in short succession in the same hospital. The only option to avoid much more significant disturbances in our daily life then we see now is to isolate for as long as possible, and then work tirelessly to perform contact tracing of the newly infected and catch outbreaks while they are small.

And I believe that a vaccine can succeed where natural immunity doesn't. For example, there are viruses where you only gain partial immunity from contacting the disease, but can end up with a worse form of the disease if exposed again, like with chicken pox (varicella) leaving the door open to shingles (zoster).

I don't know that any ideas are "proven". Evidence based medicine works on just that:evidence. The hypothesis that you do not get immunity, given the evidence from all previously observed cases of coronaviruses is the least likely. Why would you then act as if it were true?

He's a deluded SV billionaire. These people have no grounding in commoners lives, he has been worshipped and lived a ridiculous lifestyle for over a decade. However brilliant or visionary his ideas, it's clear he has been sipping the same libertarian, SV mumbo jumbo that so many other SV techies have fallen into.

I find his heterodoxy refreshing, not selfish. We don't know how much worse things would have gotten without lockdown, but the negative consequences of lockdown are pretty bad too.

As for corruption and misinformation being everywhere - the truth of that is evident. This doesn't make our institutions worthless, but it doesn't make skepticism prudent.

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